I see there have been no posts in this forum for quite a long time...I hope it is still active...

I was looking at the zApp program, with an interest towards using it to create custom front end, for a mud. Ideally it would be similar to zmud or cmud in most respects. My question is: Can this kind of app be created, using zApp?

It would be hard to make a program that complex. zApp is for very quick and simple applications. It doesn't work well for large applications. Also, because only a handful of people bought zApp, zApp is currently not being actively updated. The current version still works well for some applications, but no new version is currently planned.

Good luck on the MUD client...I've spent over 10 years on zMUD/CMUD, so it's not as easy as it might look at first.

I was just hoping to be lazy - don't I know the work you have done, building zmud and cmud! - it just sounded like zapp would have allowed me to 'plugin-in' many of the features added to zmud.

I can write up a client in another language....it sounded easier to do in zapp is all. As someone that has purchased both zmud and cmud (and zmapper, for that matter), ideally, I'd love to have my players all buy cmud, but that likely isn't going to happen. Would also be cool to give the app a theme, based on the mud.

"Branded" versions of CMUD are something I have thought about, but I don't think you'd probably be able to afford it. After all, I'm barely making enough money to pay my bills as it is. If you are going to give away a copy of CMUD for free to your players, then you'll need to have paid for it somehow yourself. And while I do offer "volume discounts" for this sort of thing, most MUDs can't afford to buy CMUD for all of their players, even at a discount.

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ideally, I'd love to have my players all buy cmud, but that likely isn't going to happen.

Why is that? It's not like CMUD is very expensive. It spend twice as much each week just to fill my car with gas. Or to have dinner and a movie. You might ask your players about what kind of entertainment they are getting on your MUD and what it's worth to them to have a better experience. Some people whine about paying for any software these days, but on an absolute scale compared to all of the other things that cost money in this world, CMUD is a pretty cheap bargain these days.

Why is that? It's not like CMUD is very expensive. It spend twice as much each week just to fill my car with gas. Or to have dinner and a movie. You might ask your players about what kind of entertainment they are getting on your MUD and what it's worth to them to have a better experience. Some people whine about paying for any software these days, but on an absolute scale compared to all of the other things that cost money in this world, CMUD is a pretty cheap bargain these days.

Indeed...in fact, if I offered *.pkg files for download on the mud's webpage (or upload it to the package library), that might add a further incentive for them to buy..

Another possibility will be the new MyMuds.com project. There will eventually be a free version of CMUD that will allow people to play any session they have saved to the MyMuds.com site. Players can either pay a small monthly fee for getting a session on MyMuds.com (essentially they are spreading the cost of buying CMUD over several months of subscription payment). Or, your MUD can "sponsor" a session on MyMuds.com (again, for a monthly fee paid by the MUD) so that people can play your MUD for free using this version of CMUD.

Details are still being worked out, but the MyMuds.com project is going to have a lot of interesting possibilities to keep an eye on.